Michigan’s Old Road Dinner Train Still Seeks New Home
Published: February 17, 2026
By: Adam Burns
For decades, the Old Road Dinner Train has been one of southeast Michigan’s most distinctive tourist attractions: a slow-paced evening ride through farm country paired with a sit-down meal and, often, a tongue-in-cheek murder-mystery performance. But in May 2025, the operation publicly acknowledged an uncomfortable reality facing many excursion operators that rely on active freight railroads: when the freight business grows, passenger “windows” can shrink fast.
In an announcement reported by Trains Magazine, the Old Road Dinner Train said it would need to “find a new home and new host railroad” after efforts to keep operating on the Adrian & Blissfield Railroad (A&B) ran up against increasing freight demands. As of this writing that search still continues as the once-popular excursion train still remains homeless.
Adrian & Blissfield GP9 #1752 a rrives at Adrian, Michigan with its northbound freight on September 21, 2012. Doug Kroll photo.Why the dinner train is being forced to move
The heart of the issue isn’t a lack of demand for the dinner train experience—it’s track time and track space.
According to Trains, A&B President Chris Bagwell described a near-future operating environment in which long grain trains—cited as 105-car moves—would occupy sidings and mainline space in ways that could physically block the dinner train from leaving its station or consume the space needed to stage freight cars before and after loading. The railroad was also anticipating potential new ethanol shipments from a nearby refinery, adding to the sense that freight growth could be structural rather than temporary.
The dinner train, in turn, acknowledged that the short line’s expanded agricultural business “may not allow track access” in a sustainable way. In other words: even if a handful of special-event trips could be squeezed in, building a reliable schedule season after season becomes difficult when freight customers need priority access and sidings fill up.
What the operator said in 2025
There were several alternate locations being explored at the time (spring, 2025), with the hope of resuming operations at a new site by fall.
Possible contenders cited included:
- The Southern Michigan Railroad in Tecumseh
- Owosso, home to the Steam Railroading Institute and the Great Lakes Central Railroad
- The Charlotte Southern Railroad in Charlotte, Michigan
Those locations make sense on paper: each offers an existing railroad “identity” and communities that already understand rail tourism. The trick—then and now—is aligning track availability, insurance and regulatory requirements, station/parking logistics, and the business terms of a host agreement.
A brief background on the Old Road Dinner Train and A&B
The Old Road Dinner Train has long been associated with the Adrian & Blissfield Railroad’s public-facing operations out of Blissfield, giving the short line a rare blend of freight railroad utility and heritage/tourism visibility. Older industry coverage has even described A&B as operating what it called “the longest continuously operating dinner train” in the United States—an oft-repeated claim that underscores how central the excursion brand became to A&B’s identity beyond freight.
That context also helps explain why the May 2025 development drew attention: it wasn’t just another seasonal excursion pausing for a year. It was an established, recognizable product being pushed off a line by freight growth—the very kind of freight growth short lines work hard to attract.
What comes next, and what to watch for
If/when the Old Road Dinner Train announces a new home, it will likely come with a few telltale details that signal the move is real and operationally ready:
- A specific host railroad named (not just “exploring options”)
- A boarding city and station address
- A season start date and ticket sales timeline
- Notes on equipment moves (cars/locomotive relocation) and route description
- Any mention of track upgrades, siding capacity, or schedule windows that make dinner operations feasible
Until then, the spring 2025 announcement remains a notable snapshot of the balancing act between freight railroad growth and tourist passenger experiences—a reminder that, for excursion operators on active railroads, success can sometimes create the very pressures that force reinvention.
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